How Important is iPhone to Apple's Business? And Who Thinks it Stinks?

How important is the iPhone to Apple's business going forward? See the chart above, prepared by Fortune. Up from 5.7% in 2008 to 18.5% in 2009.

We're going to say "very" and "increasingly". Daring Fireball highlights how Apple goes about ensuring that "increasingly" part, riffing off The Loop's reminder of when Apple killed the iPod mini at the hight of its popularity and replaced it with the iPod nano:

Pen Mac -- the Original iTablet

TechCrunch has posted an interesting photo and write up of the Apple Tablet that never was -- the Pen Mac, unreleased in favor of the PDA-style Newton back in 1990.

The Pen Mac was a fully functional Mac computer (it even played the Mac startup chime) with a pen based touch screen. The screen itself was identical to the Mac Portable, but with the addition of pen touch. And of course the case was a lot smaller than the Mac Portable. The Pen Mac was supposedly not much more than one inch thick. Users could plug in a keyboard and mouse or easier input.

Apple Retail Stores: Buh-Bye WindowsCE, Hello iPod touch!

Looks like the rumors were true and Apple is finally set to replace the aging, WindowsCE + stylus based EasyPay point-of-sale devices used by the retail store staff with sexy new credit card reading, barcode scanning iPod touches. Apple will be using the same accessory access APIs supplied to developers in the iPhone 3.0 SDK.

Closing in on 100,000 Apps, is iPhone All About Quantity or Quality?

The internets are a rocking with posts about the iPhone's App Store unofficially hitting 100,000 apps, but while we wait for official word from Steve Jobs, the blogsphere is also debating the important of the sheer quantity of those apps, and whether that's more important that quality.

iGrip Custom Fit Cigarette Lighter Mount Reality Review

In these tumultuous times you need some sort of protector; the kind that will prevent your iPhone from flying off the seat to who knows where. What kind of protector is here to save the day? The iGrip cigarette lighter mount of course! [$19.95 - TiPb store link]

ORIGINAL: Just a few hours ago TiPb posted about the rumors surrounding a free (with ad support, of course) Google Navigation app, and now TechCrunch has the goods -- it's real, and it's (so far) exclusive to Android 2.0. And we quote:

Search in plain English. No need to know the address. You can type a business name (e.g. “starbucks”) or even a kind of a business (e.g. “thai restaurant”), just like you would on Google.

Search by voice. Speak your destination instead of typing (English only): “Navigate to the de Young Museum in San Francisco”.

Traffic view. An on-screen indicator glows green, yellow, or red based on the current traffic conditions along your route. A single touch on the indicator toggles a traffic view that shows the traffic ahead.

Search along route. Search for any kind of business along your route, or turn on popular layers such as gas stations, restaurants, or parking.

Car dock mode. For certain devices, placing your phone in a car dock activates a special mode that makes it easy to use your device at arm’s length.

To quote our own editor-in-chief, it looks "bad@$$", and so far it also looks exclusive to the US, and to Android 2.0, at least for now. But come on Google, you want to give it to everyone outside the US too, right?

Google Working on Free [Ad Supported] Turn-by-Turn Navigation App?

Google already provides the free Google Maps service, but could they be planning to step up to full on turn-by-turn navigation? Forbes thinks so:

Google, which generally gives its software away for free and recoups its investment through advertising, would likely sell ads within the navigation application rather than charge users, experts say. The ads could be particularly valuable because the program would know users' precise locations and destinations, allowing advertisers to pinpoint specific kinds of consumers. Google recently started running sponsored link ads in Apple's ( AAPL - news - people ) iPhone map application, which it helped build.

iPhone US Marketshare Hits 30%, Tops Most Wanted, Huge Lead in Customer Satisfaction

Apple's iPhone has hit 30% marketshare in the US, according to ChangeWave. When laying out the current players, 4,225 consumers were surveyed, 39% of whom owned smartphones, and of those the top 3 answers were RIM's Blackberry down ever-so-slightly to 40%, the iPhone up 5% to hit that 30% mark, and Palm steady at 7%. As sibling-site PreCentral.net points out, Windows Mobile, Android, and Symbian weren't even included on the chart (does that mean the percentages were too low and unchanged to graph, Changewave?)

Apple Ships Magic Mouse Software Update -- But Still No Magic Mouse

Apple has made Wireless Mouse Software Update 1.0 available for both OS X 10.5 Leopard and OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard users eager to add the new multi-touch Magic Mouse to their existing system -- when they become available. That's right, outside of buying one of the brand new iMacs Apple released last week (which include the mouse and the update), you won't find hide nor hair of the new Magic Mouse either at an Apple Retail Store or the Apple Online Store. They're still pending.

Unofficial iPhone and iPod touch Sync Coming to Linux

While Apple made a Windows version of iTunes years ago, they still haven't seen fit to roll out any official syncing solution for our Linx friends. That leaves unofficial solutions, which according to Marcan's Abort, Retry, Hack? blog, are finally on their way:

Google has just posted the above video tour of Android 2.0 Eclair, but does it look as yummy to you as its namesake? Android Central has already dished the specs, but it's nice to see them in motion and all official.